On a seemingly-normal day of adventure, Fionna and Cake enter the Dungeon of Doors after their third companion doesn't show up, but once they are deep inside, they realize that entering without him could mean their deaths or eternal imprisonment.

With a small yawn, the white-furred feline stretched out and arched her back before hopping down from the red couch where she'd taken her nap. She glanced around- her owner still wasn't up, and it was already sunset- before walking to the foot of the ladder that led up to the Vampire King's bedroom. She let out a meow and sat down, waiting for some evidence of an answer. With another mrrrowww she heard him stir and groan for her to leave him alone. Mreooooww!

"Alright…! Alright, jeez, Schwable…" Marshall Lee grumbled and threw his blankets lazily aside. After rubbing his tired eyes, he glanced out the window and saw it was already almost completely dark. He'd stayed up almost til noon that day, trying to work out the tune that had been stuck in his head for days. It was like what a crooner might sing to, maybe the slightest bit smooth jazz, but Marshall Lee just couldn't put his finger on what it was supposed to be. Still, no lyrics would come to him. Slowly but surely, Marshall Lee pushed the frustrating tune to the back of his mind and flew slowly down the ladder to the living room, plucking Schwable up from the floor and letting her lay on his stomach as he lounged back in mid-ar.

"What'd you wake me up for, kitty-cat?" He asked her with a raised eyebrow.

"Mroww," the cat answered, looking to the calendar he kept on the wall. Marshall Lee followed her gaze and his dark eyes grew wide.

"Oh Glob!" He sat forward suddenly, and thankfully Schwable had seemed to expect it, landing perfectly on her little paws and striding toward the kitchen as if she, unlike Marshall Lee, had all the time in the world. He was like a blur as he zoomed around the house to get his guitar, get dressed, feed his cat, and he nearly ran into the door on his way out. He locked it behind him and exploded into the night sky off toward the woods.

He found the massive oak tree that he was supposed to meet Fionna at, but found only a trace that she'd been there in the form of a discarded apple core. He mentally kicked himself for having stayed up so late; now he was at least two hours late to meet Fionna and Cake! Even though he'd normally be so relaxed about something like that, this particular mission was important. Marshall Lee had asked them to come with him into the Dungeon of Doors because he needed a group of three to make it through the dungeon. He figured Fionna and Cake could probably do it alone with Cake's stretchy powers, but he wanted to get to the end of the dungeon to retrieve what was said to be a magical instrument with the ability to summon the winds of the world. If there was anything Marshall Lee was boundlessly interested in, it was music and magic.

"Oh, Glob, Cake, this is bad! This is so bad!" Fionna cried as she tried her best to cling to the wall as the edge beneath her grew thinner and thinner. Below her was nothing but a dark pit, and above her was fire filling the tunnels they'd come from, so she couldn't risk jumping back up.

"Hold on, baby!" Cake cried out from the tiny nook she'd wedged herself in. Her arms stretched out to catch Fionna just as she fell, and Fionna let out a scream until she suddenly realized, she wasn't falling. Both looked down, seeing Fionna was seemingly floating over the pit as if standing on an invisible floor. Fionna dared to take a step, then a second, until she came to her sister's arms and huddled in the little nook. She picked up a piece of stone chipped from the wall and tossed it out into the pit, but it simply fell through. Fionna gulped to see it fall until it was lost from sight.

"Okay…" She took in a deep breath. "Now what?"

"There's supposed t'be a hidden door in- Oh! There it is!" Cake had managed to hit some kind of invisible panel, opening up the back of the nook to a bright, golden room that turned out to be an endless grassy plain dotted with flowers. Fionna stepped out with a sigh, looking all around. They certainly weren't outside, so she just chalked it up to magic. Cake entered too, and when they turned around, they couldn't see where they'd come from. Neither considered this an issue, and they made their way on.

"I wonder why Marshall didn't show up…" Fionna wondered aloud. Cake rolled her eyes.

"There you go again, worryin' about bat-boy. You know he said we could probably do it ourselves, so I bet he got lazy and decided not to come."

"No… he was really interested in whatever's at the end. Besides, I think as much as he tries to be all 'Mr. I-Don't-Give-A-Floop-'Cuz-I'm-Bad', he likes going on these adventures with us. I mean, the fact he hangs around the treehouse sometimes, waiting for me to come out and tell him what we did that day has to be proof enough."

"I think he's just bored. A thousand years can do that to you."

"Like you know."

"Hey, I ain't even a whole century old and I'm already bored half the time."

"You're not even a half-century old."

"Dang right I ain't. Ladies don't reveal their age, girl. So I'll stay eighteen forever."

Fionna only giggled at her sister and they made their way on. They were walking for nearly an hour before Fionna finally stopped, realizing they were never getting any closer to the red cluster of flowers on the horizon that she'd been focusing on, thinking let's just get that far and we can take a break.

"What?" Cake looked up at her sister.

"We haven't moved…"

"We've been walking forever, honey, of course we moved."

"No, look. See those red flowers? I'll race you to them." Fionna was off like a shot, hoping the speed would break through whatever magic was holding them, and Cake was off right behind her until they were neck and neck. They both focused on the red flowers, but Cake stopped when she realized Fionna was right, and Fionna paused a little bit ahead of her.

"We can't move forward?" Fionna questioned, entirely bewildered.

"No, but… I think we can move away from each other. Stay there!" Cake started walking backwards until Fionna was far away, and she felt something soft brush her ankles. It was the flowers! "Come on I think we got it!"

Fionna joined her sister, the spell seemingly overcome, but the moment they were both standing among the flowers, the ground gave way and they fell into a dark pit with only the golden light shining in from above. All around them stood stone doors. Fionna counted nine in all. She went to one and tried to push it open and Cake did the same with another. Fionna pushed and pushed until she was out of breath and slid down the door. She turned to look to Cake for help, but saw the cat looking up at something. Fionna squinted at the tarnished silver letters and read, 'The doors in three you must see, or else it is the end for thee.' Fionna huffed, Why did they always have to rhyme the riddles? Dumbwads. But she gasped as the hole in the ceiling closed up of its own accord, throwing them into darkness except for an eerie glow from the arches of the doors.

"Threes? But…" Fionna looked to Cake, and they both realized they were stuck.

"Let me try somethin'! Push on your door!" Cake called over to her. Fionna set her back to the door and pushed with all the might her legs could supply, watching as Cake stretched out and tried to push on two doors at once. Her idea was sound, but the magicks were too well-spun to allow it. The word 'three' blazed silver, and all of the doors caught fire, forcing Cake and Fionna to jump away. Once they had, the fires died and the 'three' shone as if the silver had a light inside of it.

"We're trapped…" Fionna murmured, looking to Cake as she tried to knock through the ceiling by stretching up to it and punching it. All she got were sore paws, and the two flopped down back-to-back, staring at the doors and realizing they'd made a grave mistake in coming without Marshall Lee. And even though Fionna would normally laugh at a pun like that, she couldn't even crack a smile.

Marshall Lee had just managed to dodge through the gauntlet of swinging axes when he came to a large pit in the floor. He'd made it this far so easily and quickly because Fionna and Cake had broken most of the traps already and killed any monsters. He looked down at the pit and raised an eyebrow. Fionna and Cake could stretch to the little nook below with no problem, what was so dangerous-

Then his foot landed on the floor and he heard a click. Oh, sh- Fire exploded out at him and the only way to avoid it was to jump into the pit. With his flight, he easily made it to the nook, but his first thought was to reach up and check his hair. The tips were singed, but it was okay. He turned to look around the nook and he could see the hidden panel right away. He kicked it and the back of the nook opened up to a golden field with flowers. He already knew by looking at it that there was some weird spell about it that he'd have to outsmart. He'd been around too long not to have run into things like this several times. He floated his way out into the field, not even bothering to look back to know his exit had sealed. Typical.

He looked around until a particular patch of red flowers caught his eye. They were the only red flowers and they were in an unusually large cluster. So, he began making his way toward them. It only took him a couple minutes to figure out the spell, so he sighed and just shifted into his giant bat form. With huge claws, he ripped up the ground to use as a landmark. Once he'd done that, he shifted back and floated backwards with his eyes on the torn-up mound of dirt and grass. As soon as he saw the red flowers under him, he landed and waited. Nothing happened. With a growl, he stomped, and the dirt gave way. Totally expecting it, he descended gracefully to the floor below, right in front of the blonde heroine and her cat sister who were staring at him with a mix of shock and joy.

"I told you guys we needed three people."

"Marshall Lee!" Fionna jumped to her feet.

"Yep, that's me. Who else?"

"We thought we'd be stuck here forever!"

"Nah, if anything I'd just make you wait a couple days til I felt like coming down."

"Not surprised," Cake mumbled, earning a smirk from the vampire.

"Now come on, let's solve these rooms," Fionna turned back to the door she'd first tried to open, and Marshall Lee took the door beside her. All three pushed at the same time, and the doors opened. Each was greeted with a different sight.

Fionna faced a waterfall, and she could see a glowing behind it, so her first instinct was to back away. She hated water.

Marshall Lee faced a curtain, but there was a light behind it so bright that it made his skin tingle painfully even just standing in front of it.

Cake faced a doppelgänger of Marshall Lee and she immediately turned away. "Uh-uh, no way."

So, Marshall Lee switched with Fionna, and Fionna switched with Cake. It was only minutes before Marshall Lee emerged back into the central room with a glowing crystal in hand, Cake came back with a broken-off golden blade of a sword, and Fionna returned with a broken sword hilt she'd won from the doppelganger after kicking the snot out of him. Marshall Lee looked at Fionna with an entirely unimpressed expression and she just smiled away. Cake combined the three items, placing the jewel at the pommel of the hilt where it fit perfectly, and she slid the blade back into place where it locked in. Handing the sword to Fionna, they all faced three more doors. If it was all this easy, they'd be done in less than an hour.

The next doors each offered a challenge similar to those before. Again they all ended up switching so that Cake faced a sliding stone puzzle, Marshall Lee faced a mountain that he was meant to climb (but he really just floated up the side) and Fionna faced a huge monster in an arm-wrestling competition. Again, they all emerged with items won from unlocking the puzzle, reaching the mountain summit, and soundly defeating the monster. This time, they formed another, smaller sword with a silver blade and a leather-wrapped handle with a red pommel jewel. Marshall gave it to Cake, insisting that he already had his axe guitar and needed no sword.

"This is way too easy, like way easier than everything before," Fionna commented.

"Don't get lured into a false sense of security…the last challenges are the worst," Marshall Lee warned her.

"What?"

"Well… you know how we all switched up doors to play to everyone's strengths?"

"Yeah."

"The last doors aren't gonna let us switch."

"Aw! Why not?!"

"Magic, kiddo." The three all approached the last doors which stood in a line side-by-side, and they all pushed through them at the same time, quite literally. Instead of opening, they all phased through the doors and could not return. But Marshall Lee could hear Cake scream and Fionna groan in frustration. He hardly noticed them, his eyes locked on the challenge before him: another doppelganger of himself, but this one was not his current self. He was wearing the amulet of the Nightosphere, dressed in a fine suit, and the bodies of Fionna, Cake, and several of their friends all lay in bloody heaps around him. He felt a deep pain in his chest, knowing he was facing his future self. That was, the future Marshall Lee that his mother, the ruler of the Nightosphere, wanted. He was about to do battle with the thing he'd been fighting all his life: what was expected of him.

Yay, deepest fears come true! Let me know what you guys think! Part two is already in development!

-Taiylor Wallace